Winter 2005/6
Accepting Srila Prabhupada like Jesus in ISKCON is flawed
“Later on, someone came up with the theory that Srila Prabhupada wanted his disciples to give initiation on his behalf as ritvik acaryas, and that all the initiates would be Srila Prabhupada’s disciples. As a matter of fact, Srila Prabhupada was very much against this concept. At one point he mentioned this was the flaw of Christianity. Christianity does not accept the system of a present guru. They think Jesus is the only one and no one is coming to give initiation, or no one is coming as acarya. Therefore, there is no system of continuation of spiritual knowledge...”.
(Bhakti Caru Swami, ISKCON GBC-elected guru, Spiritual Connections, Vol 13 Jan-April 1996, p. 6)
Srila Prabhupada should be accepted as the “Jesus” of ISKCON
“Therefore, when people ask “what do you mean by Srila Prabhupada’s having the position of Founder-Acarya”, my reply is:
“What Jesus is to Christianity and what Muhammed is to Islam, Srila Prabhupada should be that to ISKCON.”
(Bhakti Caru Swami, Day 3, LA Seminar, ‘Questions and Answers’, June 11, 2000)